The global rise of Afrobeats is a trend we’ve been following closely for a number of years.

One of the latest stories highlighting Afrobeats’ global growth arrived last week with the news that Nigerian superstar Rema has joined the ‘Billions Club’ on Spotify with his hit Calm Down Remix (Mavin / Jonzing World/ Virgin Music) featuring Selena Gomez (Interscope).

The original version has over 480 million streams on the platform.

As Rema crosses 1bn Spotify streams, Mavin Records boss Don Jazzy says there's 'no ceiling for what he can go on to achieve'

According to Spotify, this achievement marked the first time an African artist–led track has racked up a billion streams on the service.

At the time of writing, the track has reached over 1.015 billion streams on the platform.

Rema was originally discovered on Instagram by D’Prince and developed by Nigeria-based Mavin Records and founder Don Jazzy, who told MBW during an interview back in 2021 that Rema is “one of the young artists of his generation”.

Rema had under 3 million monthly listeners on Spotify at the time. Fast-forward two years, and Don Jazzy’s ambition of taking “Afrobeats to the world” is clearly being realized.

Today, the artist has over 31 million monthly listeners on Spotify, and in addition to joining the platform’s billions club with Calm Down featuring Selena Gomez, the duo won the first-ever Afrobeats award at the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards last week.

The track peaked at No.3 on the Billboard Hot 100 in June, the highest-ever charting Afrobeats artist In Billboard Hot 100 history, and has also been certified 3x Platinum in the US.

Spotify reports that the highest number of streams of Calm Down came from the US, India, Mexico, Brazil, and the UK, which, it added is “proof that the song truly transcends borders”.

The track has also been added to more than a million Spotify playlists.

Speaking with MBW following Rema’s streaming milestone, Mavin Records’ founder Don Jazzy argues that Rema “has the potential to be one of the biggest artists in the world” and that there is “no ceiling for what he can go on to achieve”.

He adds: “At such a young age, he is already one of Afrobeats’ most prominent torchbearers.”